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Kathrynn's Reviews > Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea
Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea
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Wow! A tremendous amount of information is packed between the cover pages of this little book. I had no idea zero created such controversy--in religion and math/science.
Fascinating facts about how our calendar system is ahead by a year BECAUSE we should have begun with year zero, not one. So, when December 31, 1999 came around, true mathematicians didn't celebrate the millenium until December 31, 2000. The Mayan's had the calendar system figured out. They started with zero, but didn't call it that.
Interesting, because we do consider some things as zero, i.e., babies are not born and then automatically considered to be 1 year old. They are 1 month, 6 months, etc, then they are 1. Makes sense.
I enjoyed how the author used examples that I could relate to when explaining thermodynamics, quantum physics, time-travel, black holes (wormholes), etc. Enjoyed the e (calculus), too.
A lot of historical information about our number system is enclosed in this book, e.g., where the word Algebra came from. There are also names, theories, dates and some interesting stories to help bring the time period(s) to life.
Appendix E: How to Make Your Own Wormhole (time machine) was humorous.
The last chapters dove into physics, time-travel, black holes, our galaxy, how the star distances were measured, how the universe came to be (big bang theory) and how it may end, how we can travel vast distances on little fuel. It was very complicated, but I now understand why we haven't been able to do it yet. The universe is still expanding. Some galaxies are speeding further away from us. There are still large hunks of nothing in space. The author goes into what is going on with our sun. Einstein and his theories are throughout the book, too.
Interestingly, all this ties right into zero. A black hole is zero. Vast nothingness. How zero and God correlate.
Great book!
5 Star Favorite!
Fascinating facts about how our calendar system is ahead by a year BECAUSE we should have begun with year zero, not one. So, when December 31, 1999 came around, true mathematicians didn't celebrate the millenium until December 31, 2000. The Mayan's had the calendar system figured out. They started with zero, but didn't call it that.
Interesting, because we do consider some things as zero, i.e., babies are not born and then automatically considered to be 1 year old. They are 1 month, 6 months, etc, then they are 1. Makes sense.
I enjoyed how the author used examples that I could relate to when explaining thermodynamics, quantum physics, time-travel, black holes (wormholes), etc. Enjoyed the e (calculus), too.
A lot of historical information about our number system is enclosed in this book, e.g., where the word Algebra came from. There are also names, theories, dates and some interesting stories to help bring the time period(s) to life.
Appendix E: How to Make Your Own Wormhole (time machine) was humorous.
The last chapters dove into physics, time-travel, black holes, our galaxy, how the star distances were measured, how the universe came to be (big bang theory) and how it may end, how we can travel vast distances on little fuel. It was very complicated, but I now understand why we haven't been able to do it yet. The universe is still expanding. Some galaxies are speeding further away from us. There are still large hunks of nothing in space. The author goes into what is going on with our sun. Einstein and his theories are throughout the book, too.
Interestingly, all this ties right into zero. A black hole is zero. Vast nothingness. How zero and God correlate.
Great book!
5 Star Favorite!
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Reading Progress
March 8, 2010
– Shelved
March 8, 2010
– Shelved as:
nonfiction-math
April 8, 2010
– Shelved as:
own
April 12, 2010
–
Started Reading
April 21, 2010
– Shelved as:
2010
April 21, 2010
– Shelved as:
reviewed
April 21, 2010
–
Finished Reading
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Adrienne
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Apr 21, 2010 02:10PM
Great review I love books about numbers and how everything has the same number of 'numbers' and how number patterns are repeated even when you don't think they would be.
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Absolutely, Adrienne. The Golden Ratio and how its pattern is repeated in flowers, fruit (pineapple). Amazing. This book recapped historical info on the Babylonians, Egyptians, Greek, Roman, Pythagorian (and the Brotherhood)...Aristotle, Einstein and many others.
It talked about how numbers were used for music (perfect fifth) and in art (zero). Very cool.
What surprised me the most in this book were the religious ramifications for daring to mention irrational numbers or zero as a number, not just a placeholder. It messed up so many set theories, people just didn't want to deal with zero. The Eqyptian's thought it was silly to have zero because they based their numbering on giving out food and no one came for zero food. I can see their point. :-)
You'd enjoy this book if you like numbers. :-)
I agree with you in that I did not know that the main reason why people didn’t accept the concept of zero and infinity was religion. I was also amazed at the reason why our calendar has no year zero. It has no zero because the two monks that made the calendar did not know about zero. It was also interesting to know that some cultures, like the Babylonians, had a calendar with a zero. We even start counting at one (unless, as the book says, “you’re a mathematician or a computer programmer” (Seife), although I wonder when mathematicians start counting at zero). I also learned about a period in time when the church did not accept the idea of infinity because of Aristotle’s proof of God (although later someone came up with a new proof incorporating infinity). I did like the last chapters until it started talking about the Big Bang. For one, it was a little funny when I read that black holes cause divisions by zero in various theories. This book is truly a great book overall and is one of the only two books I read so far with a chapter zero and the only book I read so far with a chapter infinity (This does NOT mean, however, that the book is infinitely long :) ).
